Comments to the METRO Board of DirectorsMarch 27, 2008Page 1 of 3It took seven weeks to get METRO to release current traffic count information concerning theMain Street rail corridor. Brown and Gay Engineers gathered data at the end of FY/CY 2007.It was my fear, and seemingly confirmed by the recent traffic volume data, that in fact,METRORail has strangled vehicular traffic in the corridor, and consequently decimated small businesses which depend on vehicle traffic for survival.

Impact of the

METRORail

Red Line

operation on the Main Street Corridor traffic:

COH Main St. | B&G Eng. Location PercentageTraffic North of | Traffic

ReductionCount Direction Date Commerce | Count* Date Main, North In Traffic

16,215

N&S

03/13/98

C.B.D.

2,786

08/14/07 of Commerce

-82.8%

COH Main St. | B&G Eng. Location PercentageTraffic North of | Traffic

ReductionCount Direction Date Gray St. | Count* Date Main, North In Traffic

16,770

N&S

03/05/98

C.B.D.

2,626

08/16/07 of Gray

-84.3%

COH Fannin | B&G Eng. Location PercentageTraffic North of | Traffic

#10

ReductionCount Direction Date Binz | Count* Date Fannin, North In Traffic

27,3621-way S

03/23/98

Mid-Town

5,292

08/09/07 of Binz

-80.7%

COH San Jacinto | B&G Eng. Location PercentageTraffic North of | Traffic

#14

ReductionCount Direction Date Binz | Count* Date San Jacinto, In Traffic

28,702

1-way N

03/05/98

Mid-Town

6,748

08/09/07 North of Binz

-76.5%

COH Fannin | B&G Eng. Location PercentageTraffic South of | Traffic

#23

ReductionCount Direction Date University | Count* Date Fannin, South In Traffic

24,822

N&S

03/20/98

T.M.C.

12,931

07/17/07 of University

-47.9%

COH Main St. | B&G Eng. Location PercentageTraffic North of | Traffic

#32

ReductionCount Direction Date University | Count* Date Main, North In Traffic

32,908

N&S

03/23/98

T.M.C.

22,452

11/13/07 of University

-31.8%

COH Greenbriar | B&G Eng. Location PercentageTraffic South of | Traffic

#51

ReductionCount Direction Date O.S.T. | Count* Date Greenbriar, In Traffic

12,615

N&S

06/02/98

T.M.C.

7,013

08/14/07 South of OST

-44.4%

* The pedestrians that were counted and added to the totals have been subtracted from the vehicle count.

Comments to the METRO Board of DirectorsMarch 27, 2008Page 2 of 3An additional example:Listed below are the H-GAC provided traffic counts for

Main Street at Wheeler Street.Main Street: South of Wheeler Street

Year

Vehicle Count

1996 15,5602001 18,6302006 16,530

(DECLINE Since 2001)Wheeler: East of Main

Year

Vehicle Count

1996 15,9002001 N/A2006 15,170

(DECLINE - No 2001 Data)Wheeler: West of Main

Year

Vehicle Count

1996 16,8102001 18,8302006 16,590

(DECLINE Since 2001)

All traffic counts were obtained from the Texas Department of Transportation and represent 24hour week day axles, divided by two. Weekdays are defined as Monday through Thursday.====================================Even with a decline in vehicular traffic, the intersection of Main Street and Wheeler is nowidentified as an

“F”

intersection due to the METRORail operation.I was told the intersection ratings went from a

B-C

to an

due to urban rail operations. (loss of service greater than 2 minutes).If the Main Street corridor has been so adversely impacted by the operation of METRORail, onecan only speculate there will be the same negative outcomes on the other thoroughfares slated byMETRO to be decimated.Further, METRO's consultants seemingly used the City of Houston, secondary street traffic countdata, published in 2001 for each of the corridor’s DEIS reports. The City of Houston trafficvolume count report, effective in 2000, is comprised of counts from the late 1980's to the late1990's for the various thoroughfares where traffic volume data was collected.The consultants should be aware that they have used decade-old traffic data to perform theforecasts. The data is clearly obsolete, and can not be considered reliable for a 2008 project with